Nottinghamshire Chess Association

NAG Challenge

Drag Sudar

The annual NAG challenge was expanded this year to include two more clubs, Nomads & West Bridgford. As Central were no longer at the Navigation a new
venue was needed and I booked the function room at the Horse 'n' Groom in Basford, which comfortably catered for 25 boards.

I dropped the equipment off, drove home, and walked back to find Terry Nabbs had already set up 17 boards, nice one Terry. Dave Griffiths brought the
rest and we were ready to go.

Er...not quite. There followed the usual chaos with WB and Central short of players. However both Nomads and Gambit had players to spare and a local
ex-Fiveways member had popped in.

Eventually, with apologies to John Tassi, who I inadvertently omitted from Gambit's team list, the 5 10-man teams settled down to 4 rounds of 15mpp
chess.

Defending champions Ashfield struggled in round one scoring only 4.5 points. Gambit did even worse with 4. WB and Central scored 5 but the surprise
leaders were Nomads with 6.5 points.

Nomads extended their lead in rounds 2 & 3 and won easily with 25.5 points. Ashfield recovered to score 20.5 points, followed by Gambit on 19, Central
on 18 and West Bridgford last on 17 points.

There were some outstanding performances with Dave Flynn's clean sweep over Robert Richmond, Glen Halfpenny, Mike Barnes and Steve Foster being the most
impressive.

Thanks to Neil for his usual efficient captaincy and to Kev for his usual relaxed captaincy. Thanks are also due to Tim and Dave. This event wouldn't
work without all the captains' combined efforts.

Nomads' victory was refreshing and well deserved. They'll find it much tougher next time. Ashfield will come back fighting - Neil will make sure about
that. Gambit will be properly led as I'll appoint a separate captain to look after the team. Tim has promised to bring a much tougher WB. The Walker index
is up and running.... Central will again come with only one thing on their minds: 'where's the bar?'